How the Supreme Court Shaped Due Process in Death Penalty Cases, Pg9

Key Highlights:

• The Supreme Court's 1980 safeguards for capital punishment, established in Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab, mandated life imprisonment as the norm, with death sentences only for "special reasons".
• The "exceptionality principle" requires individualised sentencing, considering the accused's circumstances and potential for reformation, rooted in human dignity.
• Subsequent judgments like Machhi Singh v. State of Punjab (1983) and Ravji v. State of Rajasthan (1995) shifted focus to the crime, leading to miscarriages of justice.
• Santosh Kumar Bariyar v. State of Maharashtra (2009) corrected this, reaffirming Bachan Singh and emphasizing reformation as a key sentencing aim.
• Recent rulings, including Manoj v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2022) and Vasanta Sampat Dupare v. Union of India (2025), introduced practical guidelines for sentencing hearings to ensure due process.
• Despite these safeguards, trial courts in 2025 showed 95.18% non-compliance with Manoj guidelines, and nearly a third of death sentences reviewed by higher courts resulted in acquittals due to flawed investigations.

Detailed Insights:

• The article reflects on the evolution of death penalty jurisprudence on The Day Against the Death Penalty, observed on October 10.
• Section 354(3) of the CrPC, now Section 393(3) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, legislates life imprisonment as the standard punishment.
• The 262nd Law Commission Report (2015) championed reformation as a crucial goal in death penalty cases.
• A study of 306 death sentences (2018-2020) found 36.1% were pronounced on the same day as conviction, indicating inadequate mitigation arguments.
• Manoj v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2022) mandated state-produced mental health evaluations, conduct reports in custody, and probation officer reports for sentencing.
• Vasanta Sampat Dupare v. Union of India (2025) held that a Manoj-compliant sentencing hearing flows from Articles 14 and 21, and a non-compliant sentence is unconstitutional.
• In Waris v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2026), the Supreme Court commuted a death sentence, stating crime gravity alone cannot exclude reformation.
• In 2025, the Supreme Court acquitted accused in 10 out of 19 death penalty cases, citing seriously flawed investigations and prosecutions.

Key Concepts Involved:

• Due Process: The legal requirement that the state must respect all legal rights owed to a person.
• Capital Punishment: The practice of executing a person as punishment for a crime.
• Individualised Sentencing: A judicial approach that considers the unique circumstances of the offender, not just the crime, during sentencing.
• Exceptionality Principle: The doctrine that the death penalty should be reserved for the "rarest of rare" cases, with life imprisonment as the norm.
• Reformation: The aim of the justice system to rehabilitate offenders and enable their reintegration into society.